Tag: Writing

There’s a first initial in front of my name now! That’s right: I, a humble blob of ink, now have a first name AND a last name. It’s because the iTunes store refused to publish me without it! So I had to go and change ALL my covers, and then I had to request Amazon change my Author Central page name as well. It took multiple days to sort out!

But, at last, Her Majesty’s Superman is available via multiple digital outlets, including Barnes & Noble and the iTunes Store! (And more.) So now, EVERYONE who wants to buy and read a book about Victorian Batman and Superman can do so.

Alec Dailey ran away from home at the height of the Great Depression to be a jockey, but he’s just too tall. Still, he manages to eke out a living as an exercise rider at Pimlico. Then, one day, the elves come to him and make him an offer: we give you a horse, and you ride in one of our races. Done! The horse, a beautiful black stallion, is everything Alec ever dreamed of in his own horse–except for the part where he turns out to the notorious (and recently missing) jockey, Sunny Jim, who got himself turned into a horse by the elves. (Eventually, they fall in love.)

(I’m trying out being a bit more informal in my book descriptions.)

It’s written in this sort of 1940s Walter Farley pastiche style, it has kind of an interesting fantasy element, and a few twists throughout. And–true to form–it has a weird sex scene. Well, it’s not that weird; one of the characters has erectile dysfunction. I realized the other day that not one of my published books has a “normal” sex scene in it. Hand on Heart features an asexual character; Manner of Death contains sex with an undead character (a vampire), so he’s all cold and also can’t maintain an erection (because no circulation!); Her Majesty’s Superman actually has a “normal” sex scene, but it’s kinda short and vague because Victorian.

I had a surprisingly hard time with the cover, and not just because I’m a sentient blob of ink. Unlike my other book covers, where finding a good stock image was kind of a problem, in this case I was actually paralyzed by a wealth of beautiful stock photography. People love photographing horses! But I liked this one because the horse was “active” (not just standing around looking beautiful) and the lensflare in the back made it look sort of magical. And this horse is certainly magical: he is, after all, a gift from the elves.

I should have done more writing this evening, but instead I melted into the couch and watched five episodes of Steven Universe in a row. Oops.

This blob of ink has also been thinking a lot lately about marketing and how difficult it is. I don’t really know what genre my stories are, you see. They’re romance, certainly, because romance is certainly a central plot. And they have explicit sex scenes. But that’s not all they are. Well, that’s all Hand on Heart is, pretty much. Sex and people realizing they’re in love. But even that story has something a little bit fresh about it, and it’s that one of the characters is asexual. (Nobody makes him have any sex, don’t worry!) But how do I fit all that in the Amazon description? “This story has sex in it if you’re into that sort of thing, but also if you’re into asexual representation one of the characters is asexual and nobody makes him have any sex! Really, there’s something for everyone!”

It doesn’t help, either, that my stories are very different from each other. The aforementioned Hand on Heart is the closest you might get to a “traditional” romance sort of story. But Her Majesty’s Superman is completely different: it’s 20,000+ words of Victorian pastiche about, well, Victorian Batman and Superman, fighting crime and falling in love. There’s, like, one and a half teeny tiny sex scenes, both toward the end, that are not terribly explicit. And Manner of Death is different again: it’s a modern-day vampire romance, but less brooding, sensual vampires and more White Castle-eating, cigarette-smoking vampires, and a medical examiner who’s more interested in figuring out why his vampire boyfriend’s blood doesn’t all pool in one place when he doesn’t have any circulation. And it has the most flat-out unsexy sex scene I have ever written. Also a hot sex scene! But first you have to get through this cringe-y sex scene.

So a reader who likes one story has no guarantee that they’ll like the next story. I think they’re all good and worth reading (of course!), and I think that even someone who, say, doesn’t usually like vampire stories might like my vampire story, because it’s different enough from your “usual” sort of vampire story. I suppose what I’m saying is that I need my readers to trust me, but why should they trust me enough to give me their money? I’m unproven.

Perhaps I should stop overthinking it and just focus on writing the next thing. The next thing will have elves. And racehorses.

Boy, this blob of ink is SLEEPY! No matter how much tea I drink, I can’t seem to wake up. But of course, it turns into this vicious cycle where I ingest a lot of caffeine in the effort to stay awake, and then I can’t fall asleep because I have become a blob of tea rather than a blob of ink.

But the writing still must get done, even if I am sleepy! I’m hoping to get a rough draft of my current story done before I go on vacation. That way, I can print out a rough draft to take with me on the plane. I find it easiest to edit on hard copy, even if it seems a terrible waste of paper, because it’s easier for me to write directly on the page. Do you know how hard it is for blobs of ink to type on the computer? Do you see any hands on that little self-portrait of me?

I had some free time today, so I tried to make this place look a little more like I want it to look, and hopefully be more helpful to people who want to see what I’ve written. I also made a new book cover while I was at it. I never liked the cover for Hand on Heart–I had to make it using Kindle Cover Creator (for reasons too boring to go into here), and their fonts and layouts are extremely limited.

What do you think? I’m a bit chagrined to have capitulated to the “half-naked man with well-developed abs” model of romance cover novel, but it does advertise “hello, there are sexy men within this book, and they have sex. With each other, even.” Also, he’s wearing gloves. It’s very important to keep your hands protected when wielding swords!

It’s a vampire romance, but I promise it’s a different kind of vampire romance. There are no sparkly, brooding vampires. One of the guys is a medical examiner, and he just really wants to know if vampires still poop. It’s nerdy and gay. Oh, and there’s a cat! Everyone likes cats, right?

Sumi here! If we haven’t been introduced, I’m a sentient blob of ink who sometimes likes to splatter out stories. You can find my books on Amazon here. I hope you like them! I like to think that they’re, first and foremost, fun to read. Whether or not they’re romantic or sexy may be secondary. Perhaps that’s not very good advertising? Oh dear.

Sentient blobs of ink aren’t terribly good at WordPress, so my apologies for any strangeness around this place as I get settled in.

Do feel free to ask me any questions, whether about my writing or anything else!